To plan and administrate the production activities of a company using the high speed calculation capabilities of the computer system has been a popular application in the industry. In the conventional production planning system, the high speed calculation capabilities of the computer system are used to administrate large quantity of components, half products and finished products to be used in production. For example, a company that produces 20 different products may need to use tens of thousand of components, if each product is made of 1,000 components. For that company, there would be several dozens of finished products and half products to be managed. The conventional automated production planning system is used to manage the stocks of these components, half products and finished products.
In the conventional art, the management of production is established on the consuming quantity of components, half products and finished products. In other words, in the conventional technology production activities are planned and administrated according to the consuming quantity or estimated consuming quantity of particular components, half products and finished products. The purpose of the conventional production planning system is to make the production or procurement of components, half products or finished product to meet the sales or production activities of a company, such that shortage or waste in stocks may be avoided. Under such a purpose, the conventional production planning may be represented by the following formula:quantity to be supplied=required quantity+safety stock−current stock  (1)wherein required quantity represents estimated quantity of components/products to be consumed within the current period, such as current month, and includes quantity of components/products for production, for maintenance, for sale etc.; safety stock represents quantity of components/products reserved for emergency according to particular company policies; and current stock represents quantity of components/products current in stock.
In the conventional technology, it is possible to generate plans for production according to estimated consuming quantity of components, half products and finished products. However, it is difficult to apply such systems to the production activities of a company with a variety of products made of tens of thousand of components and half products. For example, for every company there are “high seasons” and “low seasons”. For particular products, there could be almost no sales activities during the low seasons. On the other hand, during the high season it is almost impossible to produce enough quantity of product to meet the needs of the market, no matter how production capability is squeezed. Under such circumstance, it is possible to use the conventional production planning system to administrate the production activities during the low seasons but when the high season is close, it is necessary to conduct complicated planning for the production activities for respective components, half products and finished products. Such “production activities” shall include procurement, subcontractor production and self production, assembly, packaging, shipment, warehousing etc. Although calculations in the planning stage is not difficult, if the computer system is used, the execution of the plans so generated, however, is a difficult task for stuffs in procurement, production and warehousing departments to achieve.
In addition, the production plans as generated by the conventional production planning system can only function as reference in the management of the production. They can not be used in the production system directly or even input into the production management system directly.
It is thus necessary to provide a novel production planning system that can manage the production activities of components, half products and finished products according to correct planning of production of components, half products and finished products.
It is also necessary to provide a production planning system allowing an enterprise to conduct production planning according to corrects stock policies.
It is also necessary to provide a production planning system to provide property production planning regardless of low seasons and high seasons.
It is also necessary to provide a production system wherein results of calculation may be used by applicable automatic management system.